Washington @ Florida preview

Sun Life Stadium

Last Meeting ( Apr 30, 2010 ) Washington 7, Florida 1

The Washington Nationals will find themselves in an unusual position when they take the field for Saturday’s game against the Florida Marlins.

A victory plus a loss from the also-surprising New York Mets would pull Washington into tie for first place in the tough NL East. The Nationals (13-10) moved into second after their 7-1 rout of the Marlins on Friday night, one game behind the Mets (14-9) and a half-game in front of the two-time defending National League champion Philadelphia Phillies (12-10).

The Nationals have won four in a row. In addition, they took two of three in their series with the Mets earlier this season.

Washington finished April with its first winning record in a full month since it went 15-12 in September 2007. This is the team’s best start through 23 games since moving to Washington after the 2004 season.

The return of Ryan Zimmerman, who had two home runs on Friday night, and the constant improvement of leadoff hitter Nyjer Morgan and clean-up hitter Adam Dunn is paying dividends for the Washington offense.

But the good start has been mainly about pitching and defense. Scott Olsen threw six shutout innings in Friday’s win, and he’s tossed 13 consecutive scoreless innings over his last two starts. The Nationals didn’t make an error in the win and have given up only three unearned runs in these first 23 games.

However, Florida hasn’t done nearly as well on defense, and it has played it part as the team has dropped three in a row and five of its last six.

The Marlins came into Friday’s game tied with the Atlanta Braves and the Los Angeles Dodgers for the National League lead in errors (21). Florida’s problems continued on Friday as it made two more miscues.

The Marlins have the kind of offense that should be able to overcome errors, but so far they’ve been stuck in the middle of the National League for runs scored.

They banged out 10 hits but got just the one run and stranded 15 runners. Florida had gone 12 innings without a run before Jorge Cantu’s RBI single snapped that skid in the seventh.

The Marlins will need either more timely offense or better defense and pitching in Saturday’s game. If they lose on either Saturday or Sunday, it means Florida would have dropped four consecutive series.

Pages Related to This Topic

About Units and “ROI”

Units are a standardized measurement used to determine the size of each of your bets relative to your bankroll. For example, if you have a bankroll of $200 and you bet 5% of your bankroll each time, each of your units is worth $10. A bettor with a $2000 bankroll who bets 5% per bet has units of $100. We use the number of units to standardize the amount the trend is up or down across different bet amounts.

ROI is the best indicator of success and measures how much you bet vs. how much you profited. Any positive ROI is good in sports betting with great long-term bettors sitting in the 5-7% range.

Sports Betting Bankroll Management and ROI Guide

Weather Forecast